Chapter 1 - Cocoon
I believe in you,
I'll give up everything just to find you.
- Evanescence "Taking Over Me"
"Now is the winter of my discontent," Nell murmured, watching the steam curl up from her tall mug of chai to spread thin tendrils of fog across the window before her. The translucent glass throbbed redly as it reflected the neon "XXX Movies" sign across the street. It reminded her of the pulse beating under the skin at her wrist and neck, of the heart fluttering relentlessly beneath her ribcage. A sigh whistled between her lips.
I wish it could rest, she thought, tapping one blunt fingernail against the ceramic tile of the counter. It must be so tired. She swallowed another sigh and shook her head slightly in self-contempt. What the hell is the matter with me? She felt… jittery. Uneasy. As though a dark, thirsty mouth had opened somewhere deep inside her brain, sucking greedily at her dreams, her purpose.
Something… something just isn't right. There's something else I should be doing. Nell recognized the vague disquiet - the tiny whorls of anguish that had been blossoming in her mind for years. But the feeling had been growing stronger, recently. More urgent.
"It was supposed to stop when I got to college," she muttered, staring down into the cinnamon-specked froth. "They all said I'd be happy. Content." A man, dressed in a sleek gray suit and holding a take-out cup, frowned nervously at her as he fumbled with the door. Black liquid bubbled up from the slit in the plastic top and cascaded down across his thick fingers.
His breath hissed at the burn. "Shit!"
Nell had to stop herself from grinning smugly, and that bothered her. Raw. It was the only word that came close to explaining her mood, tonight.
The picture was haunting her; that was the problem. It wasn't even a very good picture - blurred around the edges and underexposed. But it was good enough to for her to make out the contours of the severe, pale face - the sharp cheekbones, the slight blush of compressed lips, the small line of darkness where elliptical sunglasses crossed the bridge of a thin nose.
Trinity.
It was the only photograph she'd been able to find, and she'd nearly gotten caught in the process. Even now, more than a week later, she was still jumping at the sound of footsteps on her dorm stairs at night. Fucking NSA and its watchdogs! Whoever had set up their firewalls was a genius. It had felt like they were toying with her. She shivered, the memory still too fresh for laughter. Skin of my teeth...
Involuntarily, she glanced back down at the screen of her laptop, at the grainy, black and white photo that was the only visual ID the so-called authorities appeared to have on the female terrorist. But when Nell found herself wondering what color Trinity's eyes were underneath the shades, she closed the laptop with a swift click. Enough! Why am I obsessing about some criminal? Like it or not, she had schoolwork to do.
The window had cleared, so the chai was probably cool enough to drink. Nell held the mug up to her lips and sipped it slowly, relishing the feeling of the warm liquid trickling down her throat. With her other hand, she dug into the large pocket of her backpack and extracted The Republic. She flipped it open to her dogeared bookmark at Book Seven and tried to get her eyes to focus on the words. It was still too soon for another hack, and she'd used this place once before, anyway. But the urge to open her laptop and look at that picture again was almost overwhelming.
"Get a grip," she whispered, flipping through the pages to find her bookmark. "She's a felon. A murderer. And she doesn't even know you exist."
"I'm as confused as you are," Trinity said over her shoulder to Switch as she prepped her monitor. The thick glass was cold on her already chilled fingertips, and she wondered fleetingly whether she would ever toughen up to the temperature. Or become numb. Maybe there wasn't a difference.
Switch laughed sharply and scrubbed her short, blonde hair with one hand. "Not as confused as the coppertop, though."
Trinity's fingers stopped their rapid dance across the screen, and she snapped her head around to meet Switch's gaze. "Bullshit," she replied, grinning slightly. "You can't tell that from the code."
"C'mon, Trinity," the other woman answered, quirking a blonde eyebrow at her before bending to her own display. "It's obvious."
Trinity shook her head firmly, raising pale, toned arms above her head in a stretch. She took a deep breath of the metallic air and tried to make her muscles relax. "She just wants the truth, like everyone else."
"Please!" Switch retorted with a crooked grin. "Everyone else fixates on Morpheus. This one stopped giving two hoots about him the second she discovered you." Trinity shook her head again, but Switch didn't give her the opportunity to interrupt. "Besides, I don't think the coppertop's obsession with you is just an excuse. I think he's grooming you."
For a brief moment, the Core was silent save for the echoing whir of computer processors while the two women stared at each other. "Do you," Trinity replied finally, tonelessly. It wasn't a question, and Switch couldn't tell whether the idea had surprised her or not. But before either could say anything more, the clank of footsteps sounded in the corridor leading from the mess.
"All right, ladies," Tank interrupted, slipping on his gloves as he strode towards the bank of monitors. "Ready to rock 'n' roll?" Morpheus shadowed him silently, arms crossed behind his back, and went to stand beside Trinity. She lowered herself into her chair in one smooth, familiar motion, shifting slightly to fit into the imprint her body had made in the padding after so many years of use.
"You're sure about this?" she asked him quietly, as he took hold of her spike.
"Yes," he replied firmly. "She's looking for you, Trinity. You have the best chance of getting through to her, the best chance of getting her out alive." He paused, considering, his black eyebrows drawn together. "And I think we need this one. She's subtle. Stealthy."
"She's very good," Trinity conceded, thinking back to her observations of this latest candidate for withdrawal. Her hacking was precise, almost delicate. Like… like a butterfly. The analogy came to her unbidden, and she didn't realize she had spoken aloud until Morpheus' voice sliced through the mental picture.
"And you'll free her from her cocoon," he replied, smiling triumphantly.
It struck her, then, how intensely Morpheus loved to free minds. Would it intoxicate her as it did him? She let her head fall back on the cushion and closed her eyes, released her breath in a silent sigh. I've seen him do this a dozen times. I'm fully capable. "All right," she said aloud. "Let's go."
The last sound she heard was the harsh grate of metal on metal as the spike scraped her plug. And then she was in.
The harsh roar of a motorcycle engine just outside the café roused Nell from her book. She looked up just as a sleek, silver Harley slowed to a halt next to the curb, under a street lamp. But instead of turning back to her Plato, Nell leaned closer to the window, curiosity piqued by the bike's rider. It was a woman, and she was dressed entirely in white. White boots, white pants that rippled gently in the wake of her self-created breeze, a long, white coat that fell to her knees as she swung gracefully off the motorcycle and flicked the kickstand. Even her hair looked white, though as Nell leaned forward a bit more, her nose now pressing slightly against the cool glass, she realized that it was actually just a very light shade of blonde.
The woman leaned against her bike, reached into a pocket of her pants, and pulled out a box of cigarettes. The other pocket yielded a lighter, and in the sudden flare of flame, Nell caught a clearer glimpse of her face. It was pale and hard, and unsmiling.
So enthralled was she by this woman's strange attire that Nell didn't register the tinkling bells and gust of air as someone opened the café door. She didn't hear the sharp click of high-heeled boots against the tile floor, either. But as she watched the woman outside take her first draw on the cigarette, she suddenly became aware of someone behind her. Close behind her.
A brief rush of sheer, paralyzing panic cascaded through her skin - Is it them? The NSA? Have they found me? But in another second it had passed, and she whirled around in her chair so quickly that she made herself dizzy.
And then her mouth opened soundlessly. The woman standing before her was in every way the antithesis of the woman outside on the motorcycle. She was dressed in black - pure, midnight, jet black - from the fitted, PVC coat that flared slightly over her narrow hips, to the snug black pants of the same material, to the three-inch heeled boots. Even her hair, gelled sleekly against her head, was black… her hair… the sunglasses… the pale, finely sculpted cheekbones…
"Hello, Sorcha," she said quietly, but with an unmistakable current of authority in her firm voice.
"God," Nell managed to gasp. There was a loud roaring in her brain, like the sound of the sea in a conch shell. Both corners of the woman's mouth curled upwards ever so slightly - so slightly that Nell knew she would have missed it had her gaze not been pinned helplessly to that severe, beautiful face.
"Strictly speaking," she replied, "that's not exactly incorrect."
Nell managed to smile weakly and fumbled at the chair next to her with trembling hands. Trinity - Impossible, impossible, it can’t be! - nodded once and slid smoothly into the chair, letting her gloved hands rest on the countertop. When she moved, her clothing crinkled softly, plastically.
Nell felt her breaths coming in short, sharp pants and desperately fought for some measure of calm. Her cheeks were already tingling slightly. Can’t faint, can’t faint, can’t faint... a part of her was screaming mentally. She finally managed a deep, shuddering breath and turned her head, seeing her reflection in the dark sunglasses. Nell knew that she never would have been able to meet her eyes, unshielded.
"Trinity," she whispered reverently. "Aren’t you in terrible danger, being out in the open like this?"
Trinity’s dark eyebrows shot up from beneath her shades, but her voice remained steady. "Yes, that’s true. But it was important for me to meet with you."
Nell swallowed involuntarily, her throat drier than the tiny golden barrel cactus she kept on her dorm windowsill. "With me?" she stuttered. "Why?"
Trinity leaned closer to her, close enough for her breath to ruffle the fine red hairs falling across Nell’s temple. "Morpheus and I need your help," she murmured.
It was hard for Nell to remember to breathe, awash as she was in the light, indefinable scent of her, in the soft richness of her voice. But then, abruptly, Trinity pulled away, and the sudden sense of loss jolted Nell out of her trance. Help? My help? I’ll do anything... "With what?" she asked aloud.
Trinity didn’t answer right away, but stared out of the window as the second hand marched inexorably around the face of the clock behind the coffee bar. Nell followed her eyes. The woman in white was still there, still leaning against her bike. Her cigarette was getting low.
"Are you happy, Sorcha?" Trinity asked suddenly, the softness gone from her voice now that she was no longer whispering. Nell leaned back heavily in her chair, marveling at how her alias sounded, spoken aloud. It was... elating... somehow, to actually hear it. She felt her lips stretch a little, bit her bottom lip to keep her mouth from erupting into a full-blown grin.
"Happy?" she asked, turning again to look at Trinity. "Well, right now... right now I think I’m happier than I’ve ever been." The words came out before she could stop them, and she was sure that her freckled face was turning pink. You sound like an idiot, Nellie! "But... but in general?" She pushed on doggedly through her embarrassment. "In general, no, I’m not happy. I just keep feeling like... like there’s something I’m missing. Like there’s something else I should be doing. Y’know?"
A strange shudder moved through Trinity, then, almost like a sigh. Nell watched the tight muscles of her jaw unclench slightly, and she too sat back in her chair. "Yes, I know," she replied. "I know very well." She reached up and slowly took off her sunglasses, folding them neatly and placing them with a soft click on the countertop. Her eyes were blue - a deep, dark blue - and they glittered with an alertness and intensity that both made Nell want to look away, and pinned her motionless.
"I’m offering you a chance for a new life," she continued. "A new life in which you will have a purpose, a new life in which the question, the question that haunts you, will be answered."
"What is the Matrix?" Nell whispered, feeling her pulse once again begin to thump wildly at the side of her neck. Trinity’s stare was boring into her brain, waking her up, jolting every sense. She could smell the different coffee flavors in the mugs of the customers behind them, hear the scrabble of a spider as it skittered along the wall to her left, taste the distinct flavors of cinnamon, ginger, and sugar left on her tongue by the chai.
"You can hear the answer," Trinity continued lowly, "but it will mean giving up everything. Your family, your friends, your studies. Everything. You will have to give up the world to gain the world."
Nell thought of her family, then - her middle class, white, suburban family who had never understood the duality of their daughter. The extrovert and the introvert, the innocence and the terrible knowledge, the enthusiasm and the dark intensity. They had chosen to see only one side of her. They did not know her. Her so-called friends, too - the ones she had made in these first weeks at college - they hadn’t managed to penetrate her cheerful shell, either. And as for her studies... what were they worth, compared to the things that Trinity and Morpheus could teach her?
"I want to come with you," she answered firmly, her gaze still never wavering from Trinity’s frozen-sea eyes. "I want to leave all of that behind. I want something to fight for."
Fatigue blossomed briefly on the older woman’s face as she heard Nell’s reply, accentuating the tight lines of her mouth, but was gone as quickly as it had come. "It is not an easy life," was all she said.
"I don’t want easy," Nell snapped back. "I want true."
Trinity did smile then, finally - a true smile that reached her eyes and made Nell stop worrying about how she had just talked back to the Trinity.
"The truth, I can promise you," she said, unfolding her shades with the same precise movements as she had folded them, and finally hiding her incandescent eyes. Relief and loss rippled simultaneously through Nell’s fevered brain.
She rose fluidly from the chair, and Nell stood with her. "Do you know where Huxley Hall is?" Trinity asked, looking out of the window once again. The woman in white ground the butt of her cigarette into the pavement, lithely swung one leg over the bike, and flicked up the kickstand with her white, booted heel.
"Huxley Hall," Nell mused. "That’s the old physics building, right? Down on the river. But it’s been condemned... you can’t get in!"
"I can get in, and you’ll be able to as well," Trinity told her. "Now. Sit back down." Nell dropped back into her chair immediately, with a low thud. "Finish your drink. Count to five-hundred, slowly, in your head. And then walk to Huxley Hall, at the pace that you normally walk across campus."
"Will I need anything?" Nell asked breathlessly. "My room is on the way."
"You’ll need nothing," she replied immediately. "Do not go back to your room - go straight to Huxley Hall. And Sorcha..." her voice trailed off, and Nell felt, for the second time tonight, a cold fluttering of fear in her stomach. "Try not to think about what I’ve just told you. Think about your schoolwork, or your roommate. But not about me, and not about the Matrix. Otherwise, we may both be in danger."
"I don’t - I don’t understand," Nell said slowly. This was the most important event of her life! How could she not think about it? And how could thinking put you in danger, anyway?
"I can’t explain," Trinity answered sharply. "You have to trust me."
Nell looked up at her, at this woman, standing there so poised - tense, but unafraid. Ready to risk capture, arrest, maybe even death. For me. And suddenly something was opening inside her - opening, unfolding, like a rose in a time-elapse film. It was opening and it was beautiful, a deep pool of golden, liquid light where before there had been only emptiness. It was opening and stretching her, so beautiful that it hurt, and she was falling into it, falling, falling in...
"I trust you."
Outside, the motorcycle engine roared, the bells on the door tinkled softly. And then she was gone.
Nell's footsteps echoed hollowly on the stone stairs leading to the massive wooden doors of Huxley Hall. She'd already had to duck under two stretches of "Keep Out - Demolition" tape, and a third swath of it criss-crossed the doors in a giant X. "Three times' the charm" she muttered, gritting her teeth as she barely managed to keep her legs from breaking into a jog. Patience is a virtue.
What was behind that door? Trinity would be there, and perhaps Morpheus… what would they tell her? Where would they take her? Sorcha's your name now, she told herself as she finally gained the landing. Nell no longer exists.
She went to the door and grasped the handle firmly, swallowing back a surge of anxiety that this was some kind of set-up - or worse, that Trinity hadn't gotten here safely. She pushed in, and nothing happened. The door didn't budge.
No! Nell howled soundlessly. It couldn't be locked! It couldn't be! What if Trinity was inside, waiting, thinking that Nell had changed her mind because she hadn't yet arrived! Desperately, she shoved her shoulder hard into the pocked wood as she pushed again, every muscle straining… and stumbled headlong into a dimly-lit hall as her effort propelled the door open so hard that it collided with a sharp crack against the wall. Nell caught herself on the wrought-iron banister of a wide staircase, breathing hard.
"Are you all right?" Trinity's voice echoed off the high ceiling, and Nell whirled towards the source of it, to her left. She stood next to a low, wooden table that had probably once held professors' mailboxes, but now only supported a tall glass of water. "I should have warned you about the door - it sticks."
"I'm fine," Nell replied quickly, standing up straight to prove it. "Sorry for the racket."
Trinity opened her mouth to answer, but at that moment, the woman in white walked briskly through the open door, her long coat billowing behind her. Her eyes slid over Nell without a pause.
"She wasn't followed, as far as I can tell," the newcomer said. "And Tank hasn't spotted any unusual activity around here. This may be a clean break."
Trinity nodded curtly. "Good. Tell Apoc to get online, then." The woman gave a nod of her own, glanced once, curiously, at Nell, then smirked and strode down the hall to her right. Nell watched her disappear into the third door down before turning back to Trinity.
"What happens now?" she asked, proud that her voice remained steady.
"Now, I give you a choice." Trinity held up both hands in front of her, palms up. Nell saw a glint of color in each, and moved closer for a better look. They were two pills - one red, the other blue - both almost glowing in the dusky light against the black gloves.
"Sorcha," she said softly, and Nell's eyes lifted from the red pill to her blue eyes. "Listen to me, carefully. If you take the blue pill, you'll wake up back in your bed, and our meeting tonight will seem like an old dream." Nell started to shake her head angrily, but subsided at the arching of one thin, imperious eyebrow. "If you take the red pill," Trinity continued, "you will learn the truth about this world. Beyond that, I can promise nothing."
Without hesitation, Nell plucked the red pill from Trinity's hand and slid it between her lips. The older woman wordlessly handed her the glass of water; Nell took it and gulped once, twice, then put the glass back on the table and smiled triumphantly. "What happens now?" she asked, feeling adrenaline surge in her blood.
"You wake up."
Trinity led her down the hallway and opened the door into which the woman in white had vanished. Her ears were immediately assailed by the whirs and clicks of computer equipment, and she peered curiously at the wide assortment of electronic gadgets. An old, rotary phone, off the hook. Top-line, flat-screen monitors connected by looping wires to a series of towers. A sleek, jet-black laptop running what looked like some kind of trace program.
Even more mysterious, though, were the people who monitored the equipment. The woman in white tapped at one of the monitors with one long, pale finger - a touch sensitive screen, then. A man with black hair pulled back in a short ponytail sat in front of the laptop, his eyes flicking back and forth between it and the phone. Another man, this one bald save for an immaculately trimmed black mustache and goatee, leaned against the wall next to the door, arms crossed. Nell saw them all, but the one who caught and held her eyes stood behind a high-backed red armchair, upholstery popping out of several tears in the seams. Morpheus.
He came out from behind the chair as she and Trinity approached, and Nell felt goosebumps cascade down her arms. He was swathed in a long, black coat with a high, turned-up collar. Unlike the others in the room, he still wore his sunglasses. Nell saw with a start of surprise that they were perched perfectly on the wide bridge of his nose even though they had no frames.
"Welcome, Sorcha," he said in a deep, resonant voice as Trinity broke off to murmur a question to the man at the laptop, who shook his head slightly. "It is an honor to meet you," Morpheus continued, "and to know that you will soon be joining us."
"The honor is mine, sir," Nell replied fervently. Not knowing what else to do, she stuck out her hand, and Morpheus shook it with a small grin.
"Now," he said, gesturing to the armchair, "please sit, there." Nell lowered herself gingerly into the red embrace of the chair and looked back up at Morpheus, but before she could ask what was going on, a violent shudder surged through her body, goosebumps erupting again from the crown of her head to the skin on her toes. When it had passed, she had to clench her teeth to keep them from chattering.
"What-" she forced out, gripping the armrests tightly, feeling the seams bite into her palms, "what's happening?" And then Trinity was bending over her, attaching small electrodes to the skin on her forehead, her neck. The pads of the electrodes were slick with gel, and cold, but Trinity's hands were gentle and her fingertips warm. She took off the gloves, Nell realized, but the thought was hazy, as though it had come from outside her, far away.
"Just stay calm," Trinity murmured, and Nell thought she felt those warm fingers smooth her hair back against her forehead in a short, comforting caress. "You'll be all right."
The cold in Nell was growing - beyond shivers, beyond blue lips, beyond goosebumps. It was filling her, filling her up, dimming even that glorious pool of golden light. She tried to fight it, but it was inexorable… crawling through her body, freezing everything it touched. And then, suddenly, she could feel her heart - feel it slowing, slowing, slow- grinding to a halt as the cold reached its long fingers around the warm red muscle and held it still.
Still.
It finally got to rest, she thought, just before Trinity's beautiful, tense face, hovering there in front of her motionless eyes like the moon, dissolved into darkness.
For the first few seconds after Tank removed her spike, Trinity didn't move. She didn't open her eyes, didn't even take a deep breath of real-world air.
Darkness. Darkness all around… and then light, red light, red light everywhere and I can't breathe, I can't breathe… choking…
Heaving herself into a sitting position, she finally gulped the cold, metallic air and pressed the heels of both hands against her forehead. No, she thought. I'm out. I'm out. But she knew what Nell was seeing right now - it was a nightmare, and it had returned to her, now, after more than ten years of exile.
Red, glowing eyes… cold metal tentacle seizing my neck, holding me up, helpless, helpless… and then PAIN! Sharp, inexpressible pain as the wires snap off, one by one… collapsing… can't swim… drowning…
"Trinity," Morpheus said softly, putting one hand on her shoulder. She flinched and did not look up. "You did well. Dozer just reeled her up. She's going to be fine - come and see."
Reluctantly, somehow resentful, Trinity rose to her feet and followed her captain. She did not want to see Sorcha, naked and shivering and dripping with the slime of the sewers. She did not want to remember. But Sorcha needed to see her.
Dozer had helped her to a sitting position on the titanium floor, and Switch was gently toweling her off. Her eyes were green slits and Trinity remembered, remembered how it had hurt to open them for the first time. Her head was turning slowly, back and forth. Disbelief, she thought. But then a feeble spark of recognition ran through Nell's gaunt face, and Trinity realized that Sorcha had been looking for her.
"Trinity," she rasped, using her vocal cords for the first time. Switch paused in her drying, looked up. For the first time in years, Trinity actually wanted to weep. To sob and sob, to let all the anxiety and fear and fatigue run down her cheeks and drip onto the floor. The fight to keep her face expressionless was terrible, but she won it. Somehow. At what cost?
"You made it, Sorcha," she said tightly. The girl forced her eyes open a little wider… and smiled. A brilliant, weak, dazzling smile that stung Trinity's eyes and throat like the memory of tears.
And then she collapsed, unconscious, into Dozer's strong, plugless arms.
Chapter 2 >